


a simple pair of two blues

by gummyfang



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Angst, Byeler - Freeform, Canon Compliant, Character Study, Childhood Friends, First Kiss, Gay Will Byers, Homophobic Language, Internalized Homophobia, Kid Fic, M/M, One Shot, Period-Typical Homophobia, Self-Hatred, Sleepovers, byler, william byers deserves the world let him be gay and happy duffer brothers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-03
Updated: 2019-07-03
Packaged: 2020-06-03 13:49:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,286
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19465294
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gummyfang/pseuds/gummyfang
Summary: Will wasn’t allowed to see Mike for the next couple of days after that, and it hurt. The aching ebbed from within Will subtly, a longing he didn’t quite have the vocabulary to explain, thoughts he didn’t quite have the maturity to comprehend.———A dive into Will’s younger mind as he discovers what he feels, what society wants, and just what Mike Wheeler means to him.





	a simple pair of two blues

**Author's Note:**

> my very first work on ao3!! I dug a little deep through my own experiences with internalized homophobia for it, so I hope it can ring authentic to those who may have dealt with it.
> 
> enjoy this 4am mess!

When he was six, Will Byers had just thought it common knowledge that he and Mike Wheeler would end up together. It’s not like he knew exactly what the particulars of “together” meant, but he knew adults kissed and held hands and lead their lives together. That’s what he wanted with Mike.

Will didn’t know how and when the shift would be made, when holding hands on the swings would turn into the kissing that Jonathan talked about. He supposed that when they got older, they would just know it was time. Like how Will knew when he was hungry or tired, he and Mike would simply know.

It wasn’t lost on him that the adults he saw together were a pair of one girl and one boy. Sometimes he wondered if what he felt for Mike was not normal, because all he saw were pairs of pink blue, pink blue, pink blue, and never two blues. He supposed that he and Mike would have to be the first. 

When Will asked his mother if he and Mike were weird, she had seemed disheartened and assured him that no, he and Mike were not weird, not weird at all. Young Will took this as a confirmation, when in truth Joyce had misread his question. It wasn’t: “Are me and Mike weird, separate?”. It was: “Are me and Mike weird, together?”. 

Joyce had told Will that while he was not weird, there was nothing wrong with being different. Being different was good. But when Will’s father came home to see Mike and Will having a play marriage, when he pulled Will harshly by his arm, and spat out the word “fag” towards him like it was dirt staining his mouth, Will thought his mother may have very well been lying. 

Being normal would keep him safe.

Will wasn’t allowed to see Mike for the next couple of days after that, and it hurt. The aching ebbed from within Will subtly, a longing he didn’t quite have the vocabulary to explain, thoughts he didn’t quite have the maturity to comprehend.

One day, Mrs. Wheeler came over to the Byers’s home, with Mike in tow, a smile on her face. The smile seemed fake, drawn on by a marker that could start bleeding through the paper at any moment.

“Mike has something to say” she prompted him.

Mike’s eyes looked dead, his voice sounded rehearsed.

“I’m sorry I helped us pretend something unnatural, we should continue being normal friends together.”

The words hit Will like punch to the stomach. The words “unnatural” and “normal friends” struck him especially.

He apologized because that’s what was expected of him, but at night he couldn’t stop the two words circling his tired mind, like a sick version of a dog chasing his own tail. He wasn’t normal. He wasn’t supposed to feel this way.

Will contemplated the possibility that maybe Mike had never felt that same way all along. That he had just been humoring Will, that the play pretend wedding was all that their “together” was to him, play and pretend.

When Will would go outside and look at all the pink and blue together, he realized that everyone else felt the way they were supposed to. That Will was the only one who wanted blue and blue. He was wrong. Not just that, he was defective. Like a doll taken out of the box without its left arm, he was an anomaly, something to be sent back. So he vowed to himself to never tell people of his defect, his failing. He didn’t want people to see. He didn’t want to be sent back.

———

Everything was going fine. Will’s play pretend of normalcy was working. And then he was twelve. And then he had a sleepover with Mike.

The evening was nothing out of the ordinary. They talked of grand stories, of wizards and monsters and triumph. And when the story was over, they crawled into Will’s twin bed together.

Will had assumed that Mike was asleep, but he cut through the silence loud and clear.

“What do you think would happen if a boy kissed another boy?”

What. That wasn’t a thing Mike was supposed to know about. He wasn’t supposed to know that there was blue blue in the world.

Will responded.

“I don’t think i’ve ever thought of it.” A lie. A complete lie.

“Yesterday, I found pictures,” Mike started, “In my mom’s room, of a man. A man that was in pictures with her from when they were both small. And I asked her, ‘Who is he?’. She said ‘He would’ve been your uncle.’ And I wondered, would’ve, is he dead? But she said that no, he just made very bad decisions. That he tried to replicate what a man and a woman have, with his friend, by kissing. And she had to forget him for it, because God wouldn’t like if she stayed by his side. That God didn’t like him play pretending love with another man, so now she could only remember him through pictures.”

Will was scared. Oh so very scared. He was a bit shellshocked that there were others like him, people with the same defect. But he was also frightened, because Mike knew, he knew now and he could probably sense it on Will. 

“I just don’t understand,” Mike continued, “Why God would care if two guys kissed. It can’t be much different from when a girl and guy kiss. Its not like the world is gonna explode.”

Mike paused for a bit.

Then he continued.

“Hey, what if we... tested it out?”

Mike sat up on the bed at this point, looking down at Will. And for a fleeting moment, Will forgot that this wasn’t the normal together. That this was finally their time.

The other part of Will despised himself for even thinking such thoughts. But that part wasn’t able to stop Will from nodding his head in affirmation towards Mike.

For a couple of seconds, they did nothing but stare at each other. Having a whole conversation through their eyes, like they had countless times before. And then, Mike leaned down below, to Will’s level.

Then it just. Happened. It was quick and as chaste as can be, really more a peck than anything. But Will felt his entire body fill with electricity and light, and he knew right then and there, that there was nothing else in the entire world that would make him this happy.

Mike pulled back and smiled down at Will.

“I guess the world didn’t explode.”

All Will could do was laugh.

During that night, Will had hope. That Mike had always had the same feelings Will had. That maybe all the things Will thought at six were true, they would grow up and be the world to each other. That just maybe, they would defy the odds, “normal together” be damned.

But in the morning, everything had reset. Mike acted like nothing had occurred. Like he’d scrubbed the blue and blue paint clean off his skin. When Will had tried to bring it up the next week, Mike had looked at Will like he had grown a third head. A way Mike had never looked at him before. Like he could really see how defective Will was, for the first time. So Will never brought it up.

And neither of them talked about it again.

When Will was stuck in the other world, the nightmare of cold and fog and slime, with nothing but his thoughts and the sinking feeling that he would die, he couldn’t help but think:

“To him, I’m just as invisible in here as I am out there.”

—

**Author's Note:**

> prayer circle for will byers to stay mostly happy and safe in season three. it would mean the world if you could leave a comment or kudos. thank you!
> 
> EDIT: I’m in favor of trans girl mike at this point so please don’t expect more byler content from me. glad if you enjoyed my writing though!


End file.
